China Entertainment Mythology 2004

Chapter 227 The Revenant premiered and won the championship in North America

In fact, there is no contradiction between using a white hero and heroine in "The Fault in Our Stars" and starring Liu Yifei. Of course, Li Mu definitely did not mean to let Liu Yifei play a supporting role. How about this script being made into two versions in China and the United States?

The same script of "Back to 20" can be filmed in five countries, and Li Mu's "The Fault in Our Stars" has two versions in China and the United States. It seems that there is no major problem.

It’s not impossible to shoot only one version of Liu Yifei, but the problem is that it’s not just as simple as replacing the male and female protagonists with Chinese people. If the male and female protagonists are changed but the supporting roles are not, then the male and female protagonists must communicate with the supporting actors. Most of them speak English, and there are too many English dialogues, and it is obviously not friendly enough for local Chinese audiences.

It is certainly not uncommon for foreign language films to earn extremely high box office in China, but it is an indisputable fact that foreign language films naturally have a wider audience than local films, and the more mature the market, the greater the advantage of Chinese local films .

In the future, among the ten highest-grossing films in China's film market, it would be considered good if it could be squeezed into a Hollywood blockbuster.

Now that the Chinese film market has begun to take shape, Li Mu estimates that the time point for a single film to break 20 billion at the box office should be coming soon. Converting the box office of 20 billion yuan into US dollars is close to 3 million yuan, and the box office of 3 million US dollars is about [-] million yuan. It has been a relatively successful film all over the world.

Sci-fi blockbusters and action blockbusters must of course only shoot one version, because with an investment scale of more than 1 million US dollars, it is extremely difficult to shoot one version, and the pressure on profitability is huge. Shooting two versions will double the cost for no reason. dead behavior.

And the most important thing is that sci-fi blockbusters and action blockbusters are almost universal hits. Since one version can kill the whole world, of course there is no need to double the investment to make two versions.

But this kind of low-budget feature film is completely different. It doesn’t have the ability to hit every market, so if you use a white male and female protagonist and shoot in English, it may affect its box office in China; There is a high probability that Chinese films will fail in the North American market.

But if you spend $700 million to make an American version, then Yuan Shikong’s global box office of $3.07 million will most likely be preserved.

However, if this purely American film is released directly in China, it may be difficult for the box office to exceed 1 million. The original space-time film has not been released in the mainland. Obviously, the film studio is not very optimistic about the performance of this film in China.

But if you spend tens of millions more to make a Chinese local version, is it possible for this local version to win 3 million or even 5 million at the box office?
Of course it is possible!
Since it is possible, it is obvious that shooting two versions is the most rational choice in line with the principle of maximizing benefits.

Moreover, Li Mu's statement that China's local version has a high probability of being a blockbuster is not an unfounded guess.

In 2015, the original time and space had a film of the same theme called "Get Out!"The movie "Tumor Lord" was released, starring Bai Baihe and Wu Yanzu, and directed by Han Yan. Finally, with a mere 4000 million investment, it earned a box office of 5.09 million.

Let me say one more thing here, this "Get Out!""Tumor King" is adapted from Xiong Dun's comic of the same name, and this comic is Xiong Dun's record of his own life during the hospitalization and anti-cancer period in the form of comics.

At present, Xiong Dun should have been hospitalized, and the comics should not be serialized on the Tianya Forum until February next year, but it is a pity that Xiong Dun's cancer was discovered at an early stage, and she has been accepting it positively and optimistically. However, the condition quickly developed to an advanced stage, and finally passed away at the end of 2.

It is said that Xiong Dun once said that the heroine of this movie can only be one of two people - one is herself, and the other is Bai Baihe. Unfortunately, she did not meet Bai Baihe in the end, nor did she wait for it. The official launch of the film.

This is just one basis for Li Mu to judge that such themes can have a market in China. In fact, there is another more convincing example.

In 2020, "Get Out!"Han Yan, the director of "Mr. Tumor", shot another film of the same theme, which is "Send You A Little Red Flower" starring Liu Haocun and Yi Yangqianxi.

This film finally earned a box office of 14.32 billion yuan, ranking fourth among the films released in 2020. As for why Li Mu said that the popularity of this film is more convincing?
Because, the plot of "Send You A Little Red Flower" is extremely similar to "The Fault in Our Stars"!
So how high is it?

So high that a large number of people on the Internet said it plagiarized "The Fault in Our Stars"!

However, because Disney did not carry out legal rights protection in the end, the plagiarism storm finally disappeared.

As for whether it is plagiarism, Li Mu doesn't know the inside story, and it is not easy to talk about it, but Li Mu knows that in 2016, Huaxia Company's remake of "The Fault in Our Stars" project was officially launched. The boss of the production company is Yin Lu, and the screenwriter is Yu. Yan Lin.

In 2018, due to Disney's acquisition of 20th Century Fox, Huaxia Company withdrew from the remake of "The Fault in Our Stars" project.

When "Send You A Little Red Flower" will be released in 2020, the producer is still Yin Lu, and one of the screenwriters is the Yu Yanlin mentioned above.

So it may be difficult to say about plagiarism, because you can't say that a movie where both male and female protagonists have cancer must have plagiarized "The Fault in Our Stars", but there is still a high probability of borrowing from it.

Of course, this is not the point, the point is "Get Out!"Mr. Tumor has a market in mainland China, and "Send You A Little Red Flower", which has a very similar plot to "The Fault in Our Stars", is also very popular in mainland China, so Li Mu wants to make a Chinese film with Liu Yifei as the protagonist Is there a market for the version of "The Fault in Our Stars"?
There must be a market!Because you don't need to ask, Li Mu will definitely refer to the plots of the two movies "The Fault in Our Stars" and "Send You A Little Red Flower" shamelessly.

Li Mu and Liu Yifei will go to the United States to shoot "The Hunger Games 2" in the next year, so the two films will be filmed together, and the actors will still use the actors of the original film. It is suitable, and since the original film can finally win a global box office of 700 million US dollars with a production cost of only 3.07 million US dollars, it shows that its casting must have merits, and Li Mu has no need for another thankless casting.

At night, Li Mu chatted with Liu Yifei about this matter in bed.

Li Mu: "This time I went to the United States. After filming "The Hunger Games 2", I will not return to China. By the way, I will film "The Fault in Our Stars" together. I will arrange the preparations for the new film in the next few days."

Liu Yifei turned around and lay on Li Mu's chest, and said, "Are the actors settled?"

"The invitation has not been formally issued, but I already have a suitable candidate in my heart." Li Mudao, "Ansel Elgort for the male lead, and Shailene Woodley for the female lead."

Liu Yifei raised his head and put his chin on Li Mu's chest: "I haven't heard of it, have you ever had any masterpieces?"

Li Mu squeezed her shoulder and said with a smile, "It's okay if you haven't heard of it. The budget of the film is no more than 1000 million US dollars. Of course, it is impossible to use well-known actors for this budget."

"Oh." Liu Yifei said, and after speaking, he changed his posture, resting his head on Li Mu's arm and getting ready to sleep.

At this time, Li Mu said again: "In addition, I plan to make another Chinese version of "The Fault in Our Stars", you can help me with my advice, let's see which of these actors and actresses in our country is suitable for the role? "

Hearing this, Liu Yifei turned over and pressed on Li Mu's body, with two snow-white arms supporting Li Mu's chest, making Li Mu feel a little uncomfortable.

"What's wrong with you?" Li Mu asked.

Liu Yifei put his head in front of Li Mu, with a grin on his face: "Haven't figured out who to play?! Why don't you think about it again?!"

Li Mu pretended to suddenly realize: "You mean... you?"

Liu Yifei nodded repeatedly, and smiled while nodding.

Li Mu shook his head: "You? Not suitable!"

"Why?" Liu Yifei asked.

Li Mu pretended for a long time before saying: "There are a lot of kiss scenes in it. If they are all filmed in the wrong place, it doesn't feel good. If it's a real kiss, I can't accept whoever the actor is."

"Stingy ghost." Liu Yifei was stunned for a moment, then muttered, after a while, she suddenly rolled her eyes and said, "Yes, cheapskate, can you play the leading role yourself?"

"I act by myself?" Li Mu pondered for a while before asking, "Don't you know your husband's worth? Me, Li Mu! Such a great director! You asked me to act in such a low-budget film ? And both characters have cancer, I think it's unlucky, so I won't act... definitely not act!"

……

In the end, Li Mu succumbed to Liu Yifei's despotic power and had to succumb. Miss Sister made a big move—a big move that Li Mu had never taken.

……

The next day, Li Mu called Liu Siying to his office, and told her that he was going to prepare two versions of "The Fault in Our Stars", and then he also learned about the progress of other projects in the company.

The filming progress of "You Who Came from the Star" is almost halfway through, and "Shanshan Is Coming" and "Huaxia Partner" are currently in the preparatory work, and it is said that they will start shooting soon.

In addition, "Back to 20" starring Bai Bing and "Shark Beach" starring Yang Mi have just started the preliminary demonstration work, and it is expected that the official launch may have to wait a few years.

"What has Tong Liya been up to lately?" Li Mu asked again after chatting about a few projects.

Liu Siying said: "After "Beijing Love Story" hit the air, Chen Sicheng began to concentrate on preparing his first movie. The copyright of Jingai is in our company's hands, and Tong Liya is an artist under our company. Chen Sicheng wants to make a movie version "Beijing City Love Story" would definitely not work without our company's nod, so now he runs to me all day long."

Li Mu asked: "Do you think Chen can make this movie well?"

Liu Siying said: "People in the circle are not very optimistic about him. The ratings of "Love Story in Beijing" are indeed amazing, but making a good TV series does not mean that he will be able to make a good movie. After all, he has no experience in making movies. But I still I tend to authorize him to make this movie version, judging from the previous contacts, this young man is still very talented."

Li Mu nodded: "Then authorize him to shoot. I agree with you. This person is quite talented."

In fact, Li Mu specifically mentioned Tong Liya this time. He originally wanted to arrange a new drama for her, that is, "Obstetrician" also starring Tong Liya in his previous life. I remember that the ratings of this TV series are still very good. As one of Tong Liya's masterpieces in the original time and space, the company will still vote for this work sooner or later.

……

The time soon came to October 2011, 10. On this day, "The Revenant" and "Steel" were officially released globally simultaneously.

In the schedule of early 10th, there were no strong players in the mainland market.

As of October 10, the highest-grossing work in the market is "Painted Wall", which has been released for 6 days, with a daily box office of more than 9 million.

The second is "Legend of the White Snake", with a daily box office of more than 800 million.

No.3 is a foreign film released for 7 days, with a daily box office of only about 300 million.

That is to say, in this schedule in early October, the only thing that can pose a certain threat to "The Revenant" is "Iron Armor and Steel Fist", which was released at the same time.

Speaking of the film "Steel Armor", in fact, its background is really not small. In addition to the male protagonist being Uncle Wolf in "X-Men", the director of this film is also very famous, that is, Sean Levy, The name alone may not be very familiar to Chinese people, but if you want to talk about the works he has directed, I am afraid that most Chinese people have heard of it.

For example, he was the director of the fantasy film "Night at the Museum" released in 2006. The final global box office of this film was as high as 5.75 million U.S. dollars, which is considered a very successful work.

In addition, the producer of this film is even more amazing, that is, the famous Steven Spielberg, who has been named the world's most box office appealing director many times in a row.

Therefore, before the official release of the two films, quite a few people actually felt that the box office of "Armor and Steel Fist" should be able to surpass "The Revenant".

As a result, when the box office of the two films was officially counted, many Chinese people were very surprised.

In the domestic market, the box office of "The Revenant" was 7300 million yuan on the first day, 9200 million yuan on the next day on Saturday, and 7100 million yuan on the next day.

During the three-day premiere, the domestic box office was 2.36 million yuan.

On the other hand, "Iron Armor and Steel Fist", which was still placed high hopes by quite a few netizens before.

1500 million yuan on the first day.

2100 million yuan the next day.

1700 million yuan on the third day.

In the first three days of its premiere, the cumulative domestic box office was 5300 million yuan—only a quarter of that of "The Revenant".

This is true in the domestic market, as well as in the North American market.

in North America.

The cumulative box office of "The Revenant" in the first weekend was 5900 million U.S. dollars in three days, ranking first in the North American box office list that week.

The box office of "Armor and Steel" was $2700 million in its opening weekend, less than half of "The Revenant".

In overseas markets outside of North America, the performance of "The Revenant Hunter" is also better than "Armor and Steel Fist".

"The Revenant" has the best box office performance after North America and China is the United Kingdom, with $1000 million in the first weekend; followed by Germany, with $900 million in the first weekend; and France, with more than $800 million.

The best-performing market for "Armor and Steel" outside of North America is South Korea, with a cumulative total of more than 600 million US dollars in the first weekend; followed by Russia, with more than 500 million US dollars; and RB, with more than 400 million US dollars.

In short, whether it is the North American market, the Chinese market, or overseas markets other than the two, the box office performance of "The Revenant" is far better than that of "Iron Armor and Steel Fist".

And this inevitably surprised many people who previously thought that "The Revenant" was an Olympic film, so the box office was probably not as good as "Armor and Steel".

(End of this chapter)